Kevin Appier

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I have him ranked very high, to the point of being a serious candidate.

DanR says my rankings are too favorable to modern pitchers whose careers lasted long, but his peak is outstanding, he was probably the best pitcher in the majors in the early 1990s that was not named Clemens or Maddux.

Very interesting candidate - do not dismiss him without doing your homework.

I will definitely give him a nice long lookover. Clearly, he won't do well with rank-in-cohort voters: his prime overlaps with that of future HoM'ers Clemens, Maddux, Randy, Pedro, Smoltz, Glavine, Schilling, Brown, and Mussina. Do we really want a tenth 1990's starter? And if we do, should it be Appier instead of his onetime teammate Cone? Can we induct one without the other? Are their records sufficiently superficially superior to that of Saberhagen to compensate for the fact that Saberhagen needed a 1980's-pitcher-drought-boost to get in?

Yeah, I'm not saying slam dunk or anything, just that he was a great pitcher from 1990-97, and absolutely belonged in with the group you mention for that 8 year stretch.

He didn't last as long, but should look very good to peak/prime guys. His losing the 1993 Cy Young to McDowell was explainable (McDowell won 20 and his team made the playoffs for the first time in 10 years), but still an awful choice.

Appier was a fine pitcher, but I don't see him anywhere near my ballot.

His closest comp in my system is Frank Viola, who has more top 10 IP finishes (8 in consecutive seasons, if you don't allow his cross-league trade in 1989 to drop that season out of the picture) and top 10 ERA+ finishes (6, four of them in top 10 IP seasons) than Appier (2 and 5, respectively, with both top 10 IP finishes occurring in years in which he led in ERA+).

Viola has not gotten anywhere as a candidate.

Hippo Vaughn is also a close comp in my system. Undoubtedly a fine pitcher and the best his league had to offer after Pete Alexander for a couple of seasons, but there's not enough for him to be a HoMer.

Whenever I think of Kevin Appier, the first thing that comes to mind is when I saw him interviewed on Up Close and disclosed that his doctor told him to eat Taco Bell if he insisted on eating copious amounts of fast food, which he did.

Whenever I think of Kevin Appier, the first thing that comes to mind is when I saw him interviewed on Up Close and disclosed that his doctor told him to eat Taco Bell if he insisted on eating copious amounts of fast food, which he did.

His brother was my high school chemistry teacher.
His daughter was in my son's 5th grade class. I used to question my son about that, since Appier would have been a father at age 18/19, but according to imdb (of all places), they list a daughter Britney born in 1987. Whadya know.
I don't know if that was our greater brush with fame in KC or if having Derek Alexander's mistress and their son live on our street or knowing the Fox News Anchor (John Holt) was the bigger deal. :)

For Jose Rijo, BaseBall-Reference does not generate the list of ten most "Similar Pitchers" through so-called age baseball age 30. (That is a bug with proximate cause Rijo's missing years after age 30.)

Beside its better known flaws, "Similar Pitchers" is a career measure only, so it does not see Bob Gibson putting together the similar career in six seasons, Kevin Appier in eight seasons, and Jose Rijo in 12 seasons, namely age 19-30 including a short season at age 30. (I exaggerate, but the caricature is true.)

Anyway Bob Gibson is number one on Jose Rijo's list, so Bob Gibson's own list (together with Kevin Appier's that JoeD linked just above) provides some flawed perspective on Jose Rijo.Bob Gibson "Similar Pitchers" thru age 30

Gibson 125 and Rijo 122 are the two ERA+ > 118 among the "Similar Pitchers" for Kevin Appier thru age 30.
Appier 134 and Gibson 125 are the two ERA+ > 118 among the "Similar Pitchers" for Jose Rijo thru age 30.

Age at end of "baseball age 30" season --October, although Rijo pitched only 69 inns, Appier only 15 inns, Gibson 280 inns.
30.5 yr.mo, Rijo
30.10, Appier
30.11, Gibson

Why focus on age 30?
Because the point is to illuminate Rijo and Appier with the brilliant fame of Bob Gibson, and Bob Gibson doesn't yet show up so high on their age 29 lists. Which is more impressive: your pitching career is superficially most similar to Bob Gibson's thru age 30, or superficially most similar to Don Wilson's thru age 29?
(Poor Don Wilson pitched 0 innings at age 30, r.i.p.)

My favorite Gibson development factoid: Gibson is (within a few months) the same age as his teammate, Ernie Broglio. Through the year before the trade their records were very similar, with Broglio being perhaps a hair better.

My only point was to say that yeah, Kevin Appier was pretty similar to Bob Gibson before the injury, except he was better, which is pretty impressive that's all. I do realize it's a selective endpoint thing, etc.. Gibson does show up on plenty of Appier's lists though.